10/16/11 Rev. Suzanne Leonard

Be impeccable with your words. (From Don Miguel Ruiz, The Four Agreements.) Greet everything in your life with kindness and caring and move on.

Don’t take anything personally. That mean look you got might have been caused by a toothache, and have nothing to do with you. The driver that cut you off on the freeway might have been on her way to an emergency. Even when there are a lot of people “on their ways to emergencies”, don’t take it personally.

Don’t make assumptions. Ask questions. If you need a keyboard, for example, and someone has a keyboard, ask if the keyboard plays. We were raised not to ask any questions. We grew up with “braces on our brains”.

Always do your best. We are practical, positive, progressive at Unity. We are culturally Christian but spiritually unlimited. Everything we learn, we learn through repetition until we can live it. We need to move forward – take a class, move into a setting where we embrace greater good and expression.

The essential impulse in all of life is to connect. (Lynne McTaggart, The Bond.) We came to connect on all levels.

4 Ways (Signatures) to connect –

1. we need to belong – we are tribal
2. we need to agree – we dance in cadence with each other; we feel agreement
3. we need to give – time, talent, and treasure
4. we need to take turns – we can’t give a gift if we don’t have a turn

Do your best with passion in your life, with passion in your work, with passion for your friends, and with passion in your garden, and God will be with you and bless your life!

Sermon, October 16, 2011 - The Agreements & Beyond [ 21:13 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

10/9/11 Rev. David McArthur

How can we use spiritual power when we are reaching for that greater goodness but run into blocks? Then the busier we get the easier it is to forget that power, but we need it twice as much. We find the power in that still spot in which we experience the connection, just being at One. It is nothing and it is nowhere – the quiet, still point in the middle of our always-turning world.

How do we make the connection? Jesus said, “Peace. Be still.” “Be still and know that I am God,” comes from the psalms. The journey to the stillness has a path – meditation. But recognize that when we try to meditate, the mind wants to focus on random thoughts, forgetting to be still. Many use a mantra, mandalas, and so on, but still fall between the words. It is in the deep thought, the deep feelings where we experience the divine silence itself. In that stillness, that quiet, focus on the deep feeling of love until it goes into what is just “presence”, where you are resting deeper than thought or feeling. You are resting with the one that is God.

Then when you finish you go from deep peacefulness into the energy of the world which hasn’t been in the peacefulness, and the beautiful peace is lost to irritation and frustration with the world and negativity. Instead, come out through the heart. You went in through the heart. Come out sending the peace out to the world, the things you face in the world. Say, “Divine Love goes before me making easy, joyous and successful my way.” This way you are connected with Spirit as It is working through the activity before you– even if It seems well hidden. You know God is good all the time– in the stillness and also in all the busyness before you. And everything before you is the pure divine love of God!

Sermon, October 9, 2010 - Still Points in a Turning World [ 17:14 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

10/2/11 Rev. David McArthur

In the process of spiritual growth, there are two spiritual practices that make a practical difference: blessing and giving. It’s part of a greater depth and growth of your spiritual consciousness. A “problem” is of your own consciousness. Bring it into wholeness by blessing it. God only knows wholeness, not “part” of anything. If we are not experiencing wholeness then there is work to be done. Blessing reaches into the wholeness. Blessing brings the wholeness through you, and not just in the solution to the problem, but in other areas of your life as well. Open to a greater flow of spiritual energy, directing it with intention.

Jesus combined blessing with giving. Twice, He fed crowds of thousands with about half a dozen loaves of bread and a few fish. (Matthew 14) He blessed what He had and then gave it to the disciples to give to the people. Another time the disciples had only 5 loaves of bread for themselves, and feared it was not enough. He again fed all of them, admonishing them that “they didn’t get it” – that it was divine substance that He brought into manifestation. It was the blessing of what they had and the giving of it that brought forth from the divine substance the solution to their problem. It was a demonstration for us how we use spiritual energy consciously with intention.

In the perception of a “problem”, you aren’t perceiving the goodness there. Call it forth. It responds to your need when you bless it and give from what you have. You are empowered to bring forth what you need. And we do this together – we call forth the demonstration, the manifestation – as with our renewed building and grounds we returned to just a year ago. And when it is time to go to the next step we gather to bless what we have, what we have done.

To experience the flow of abundance, give. You have something to give. Find it. Give freely with joy. Set the table as an experience of blessing. Make a list of what you need, affirming the good that is coming. The “change” is within one’s self. And then the world changes. Change comes from the center out to the circumference. The goodness is out there just waiting for you to get your act together. God is good all the time! Give. Bless. Do this for yourself and hold this truth for others.

Sermon, October 2, 2011 – Blessings, Giving & Faith [ 24:15 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download